In the prior art, there have been developed and used various types of armored vehicles having rotatable turrets with guns mounted thereon. Problems have developed though in that the ammunition has not been stored in such a manner that it could freely feed to the main gun without getting bunched and jammed. Further, after the guns had been fired and the brass ejected, no suitable means had been developed for moving the spent links in a free flowing manner away from the gun to a discharge means. This is particularly important since when the ejected links jam the gun quits firing. In the past, it was also the common practice to collect the spent links within the armored vehicle despite the fact that they occupy valuable vehicle space.
It was also the practice to have the main storage box for the link fed ammunition for the main gun be configured in an arcuate shape along part of the circumference of the basket platform. The linked ammunition would be stored in this box in a layered manner. However, these stored links would then have a fan like configuration, which would tend to become intermeshed and entangled particularly as the vehicle traversed rough terrain. When tangled the linked ammunition could not be fed continuously to the gun and the gun would stop firing until the ammunition was straightened out.
A serious previously-unsolved problem was caused by the link eject means. The links have guide tabs, as more fully described later, which travel in channels in the arcuate shaped link eject chutes. The sharp edges of the guide tabs would cut into the channels as the links traveled around the curved portions thereby jamming the links in the eject chutes and shutting the gun down.
In the past the manual elevation and trigger assembly for the weapon system included a handwheel rotatable by a handle positioned to the left of the gunner. The rotating handwheel activated through a gear box the pump for the fluid actuated cylinder drive means which then elevated the gun. The trigger button was activated by the gunner's left thumb and had a direct electrical contact through rotating electrical brushes in the rotating handwheel to the firing mechanism. The brushes would tend to wear, necessitating in-field replacement. This was a complicated and expensive arrangement.
In the past, it should also be noted that no light armored turret had been developed to successfully carry an M242 weapon station, consisting of an M242 25 millimeter automatic cannon and an M240 7.62 Coax machine gun. The present invention is the first such light armored turret with such a weapon station.